IPad, IPhone Tackle ‘What-to-Watch’ Dilemma: Rich Jaroslovsky

With flat-screen televisions, smart
phones and tablets, there have never been more ways to watch
movies and TV shows. And with Netflix, Hulu and their ilk, there
have never been more sources.

The missing piece is figuring out easily what content is
actually available and getting it to the screen you want to
watch it on.

I’ve been trying out a pair of very different approaches to
tackling that problem from two Silicon Valley startups, both
making use of Apple Inc. (AAPL)’s iPad, iPhone and iPod touch.

One, Fanhattan, is a free app that acts as the ultimate TV
Guide, helping you locate movies and shows for viewing on, or
via, your iPad. The other, Peel, is a $100 “appcessory,” a
gadget-plus-app combination that turns your iPhone or iPod touch
into a super-smart remote control for the stuff coming to your
television via cable, satellite or Internet connection.

While neither represents a complete solution, both are
useful, depending on your viewing habits.

Fanhattan’s view of the world is content-centric, aiming to
bring together in one place not only every option you have for
viewing a movie or show, but also reviews, trailers, and even
links to buy tchotchkes.

From the main screen, you choose either movies or TV shows,
and are then presented with options to search for a specific
title or browse a variety of categories and criteria, from genre
to critics’ picks. Select one, and Fanhattan aggregates
information from online sources and displays it in a visually
rich environment.

Appropriate Apps

If you choose a viewing option the iPad and Fanhattan
support -- Netflix’s instant-view service, for instance, or Hulu
Plus -- Fanhattan will launch the appropriate app if you already
have it, or prompt you to install it if you don’t.

This being the season for big, noisy action movies, I
entered “Transformers” and chose the 2009 installment,
“Revenge of the Fallen.” Under “Watch Now,” I was given
options to view the trailer and to rent or buy the video from
Apple’s iTunes store for immediate download.

But there was also much more: a summary of the plot, to the
extent there is one; critics’ reviews from Rotten Tomatoes;
information on the cast and crew (sadly, the YouTube selection
for “Megan Fox Sexy Movie Scenes” was disabled); and even a
link to purchase the Transformers 2 Revenge of the Fallen Movie
Scout Class Action Figure Breakdown ($9.99 from Amazon).

I had some issues with Fanhattan. The navigation, handled
by a variety of taps and up-and-down and side-to-side swipes,
was overly complicated. And when I searched for an episode of
Larry David’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” my only viewing options
were to buy it from iTunes or rent it from Amazon -- even though
it was also available through Time Warner Inc. (TWX)’s HBO Go app,
already installed and active on the same iPad. (Fanhattan says
it hasn’t yet established a relationship with HBO, so its
results don’t show up in the app.)

While Fanhattan has to get more comprehensive, its looks
and general approach make it an appealing starting point. That
brings me to Peel, which attacks the what-to-watch issue through
the device you’re still most likely to be watching on: your
television set.

Colorful Tiles

The Peel app, which is free, learns your viewing tastes based
on information you provide, as well as its analysis of what you
tend to watch and even what time of day you like certain kinds
of programming. Having told the app what cable system I’m in, it
found and displayed appropriate programs as colorful tiles on my
iPhone, refining its suggestions the more it learned about me.

Its real value, though, comes when it’s paired with the
$100 palm-size gadget that looks vaguely like a pear. It allows
the app to control your TV and the devices hooked up to it
without the need to plug anything into either them or your
iPhone.

Instead, you plug a special cable into a port on your home
router, then position the battery-powered pear near your video
gear. A one-time set-up routine introduces the app to your
television, cable or satellite box, home theater, Blu-ray player
and whatever else you’ve got. No more figuring out which TV
input which device is plugged into; you simply choose the device
you want to control, and you’re presented with an appropriate
remote on your mobile device’s screen.

Ordered by Interests

Now, when the app locates programs for you, just poke one
of those colored tiles -- ordered by your interests, not to the
arbitrary channel numbers of a grid -- and you’ll flip straight
to the program.

I found the Peel generally worked pretty well, though once
or twice I lost the virtual controls on my iPhone and just faced
a blank gray screen. In addition, Peel recommends locating its
router cable within 25 feet of the pear, which may not work in
your particular layout.

For the moment, Fanhattan, with its online orientation, and
the TV-centric Peel don’t directly compete. But the lines are
rapidly blurring. Fanhattan is working on a version for
Internet-connected TVs, while the Peel already can control
devices that hook you into the Net, like Apple TV. And both are
working on versions of their apps to run on mobile devices using
Google Inc. (GOOG)’s Android operating system.

The struggle to control how you’ll access entertainment in
the future has barely begun. Fanhattan and Peel, each in its own
way, have successfully staked out a piece of the turf.

(Rich Jaroslovsky is a Bloomberg News columnist. The
opinions expressed are his own.)